Spent some time Monday cleaning up the garden for Denise, so she can plant snap peas and beans and, eventually, tomato starts. The raspberries are blooming and even setting fruit, with the enthusiastic assistance of the honeybees. And when I pulled out the grass from around the rhubarb, I found out it's way past ready to pick--12-15 inches high, and as thick as my big toe. We brought in a nice sized basket of stems, and I gave Denise her choice: pie, crisp, or upside-down cake.


She chose crisp, which is fine with me. I honestly like pie a little better, but after wrestling with the sink all day, crisp is so much easier. This is an adaptation of Grandma Gosar's Apple Crisp* recipe, here adapted for the ruby stems. (I bought rhubarb in a grocery store, once, before I had my own plants. Is this celery? asked the checker. No, rhubarb, I replied; You use it to make pies. Oh, so it's sweet? Uh, no.)
Rhubarb Crisp
5 cups of sliced rhubarb
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1 T water
1/3 cup butter, melted
Grease a 9x13" cake pan (although I use an 11x11" shallow squared baker I made just for crisps), spread rhubarb evenly in pan and sprinkle 1/3 cup sugar over the top.
Whisk or sift together dry ingredients. Add unbeaten egg and water and mix with a fork until crumbly. Distribute over the top of the fruit, then drizzle with melted butter.
Bake at 350° F. for 40 minutes.
*(For apple crisp, substitute 5-6 cored, sliced apples for the rhubarb. Don't put any sugar over the apple slices, and dust cinnamon over the topping after drizzling the butter.)


She chose crisp, which is fine with me. I honestly like pie a little better, but after wrestling with the sink all day, crisp is so much easier. This is an adaptation of Grandma Gosar's Apple Crisp* recipe, here adapted for the ruby stems. (I bought rhubarb in a grocery store, once, before I had my own plants. Is this celery? asked the checker. No, rhubarb, I replied; You use it to make pies. Oh, so it's sweet? Uh, no.)
Rhubarb Crisp
5 cups of sliced rhubarb
1/3 cup sugar
1 cup flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1 T water
1/3 cup butter, melted
Grease a 9x13" cake pan (although I use an 11x11" shallow squared baker I made just for crisps), spread rhubarb evenly in pan and sprinkle 1/3 cup sugar over the top.
Whisk or sift together dry ingredients. Add unbeaten egg and water and mix with a fork until crumbly. Distribute over the top of the fruit, then drizzle with melted butter.
Bake at 350° F. for 40 minutes.
*(For apple crisp, substitute 5-6 cored, sliced apples for the rhubarb. Don't put any sugar over the apple slices, and dust cinnamon over the topping after drizzling the butter.)